Special to The Canadian

LONDON — When Tony Blair recently published his memoirs, he leapt back into the headlines from the well-heeled privacy he has nurtured since completing 10 years as Britain’s prime minister with a serving of what was essentially old news: that he feels no need to apologize to critics who have cast him as a pariah for his role in precipitating the Iraq war, and that he had a deeply acrimonious relationship for years with Gordon Brown, the long-serving political associate and rival who succeeded him in 2007.

Acknowledging that some of his own supporters have urged him to say that the war was a mistake, Mr. Blair says in the book that he cannot do that. “I can’t regret the decision to go to war,” he says.

Tony Blair could be viewed be an articulate spokesperson of a jingoistic leadership that lacks empathy.